Larry Marsicano, executive director of the Candlewood Lake Authority, left and Bob Studwell, an officer with the state environmental conservation police, talk together on Candlewood Lake Thursday, July 11, 2013.

"We found it in about 30 feet of water," said Robinson, who was working with the authority's Project Clear for area students last month when a diver with him "came up with someone white. It was the sign."

The boaters who discarded it were not exceptional in their knuckleheadedness. They routinely trash the islands, leaving their empties and starting fires. There's a bag of charcoal stashed on Sand Island now.

But, lacking briquets, people simply cut down the islands' trees for firewood.

Larry Marsicano, the authority's executive director, said the abuse is being matched by erosion, which is cutting away at the side and edges of the islands, exposing tree roots.

"You can't believe the chop out here on weekends," Marsicano said of the combined wakes of hundreds of boats.

The result is the damage and destruction of features that give the lake charm, as well as providing people places to stop and relax, and wildlife a little shelter.

"They're incredibly valuable," he said.

The islands are actually high points in the landscape. When Connecticut Light & Power Co. created the lake by building the Rocky River Dam in New Milford in 1928, the water covered 5,420 acres of valleys and fields.

The islands once were hills. Some are just little knobs of rock and trees, like Skeleton and Skull islands in New Fairfield. Some are flatter and more accessible, like Sand Island in New Fairfield and City Island in Danbury.

Almost all of them are owned by FirstLight Power Resources, the utility that also owns the dam and lake.

FirstLight spokesman Chuck Burnham said the utility is aware of the problem.

"We want to be good stewards of the lake," he said "We want to work with the towns and the lake authority to help. We just wish they (the islands) weren't mistreated to begin with."

Pine Island in New Fairfield is divvied up among private owners. They're not allowed to have any permanent structures on the island, but they have gradually been building things like decks, extra docks and outhouses on their little plots.

"They have accessory structures without any permanent structures," said Chapman, who said each of the owners has received a letter, telling them if and how they're violating town regulations with what they've built.

Marsicano said people should enjoy the islands, tieing their boats up near them and using them for picnics and swimming. But they should realize that overuse and abuse, will shorten the islands' lives.

"You don't need to chop everything down and destroy the vegetation," he said.

"It's the same as any other town park," FirstLight's Burnham said. "Just because they're islands doesn't make them any different."